Principal Parts
by Sorrel Forbes
Summary: These are the principal parts of John and Sherlock's love: amo-amare-amavi-amatum. Or: in which Sherlock returns from death, and is presumptuous; in which John really does love Sherlock, but has trouble telling his friends and family; and in which neither John nor Sherlock screw things up too badly.


John turns around, and there's Sherlock, in his kitchen, drinking the mug of dreadful instant coffee that John had been about to knock back in preparation for a long, dull day at the surgery. And before John's even properly taken in his presence, Sherlock's right up close in his personal space. As if he hadn't been gone for three years at all; as if this hadn't been John's first inkling that he wasn't, in fact, dead.

Sherlock leans in close to John's face, breathing out his rank coffee breath for John to breathe in. Disgusting, thinks John, only he can't bring himself to say so, and, actually, he doesn't really mind at all.

Sherlock puts a hand on his cheek, and runs a thumb over his upper lip.

"John." he says, fretfully.

"John."

A promising start, perhaps, but his voice has developed an unmistakably contemptuous undertone.

"What is this, this _caterpillar_ that you've cultivated? Have you really no discrimination?"

John sighs.

This is what he's realised—coffee breath and insults; sharp tongue, sharp wits, sharp elbows—he realises: "I love this man."

This is what he says. He kisses Sherlock, and then he says to him:

"Sherlock, you tosser. You absolute wanker. So what if I've grown a mo?"

* * *

><p>John returns home later that evening to a shouty Sherlock. Apparently he's imparting news of their "happy announcement" to Mycroft, even if it is by means of a belligerent phone call. Well, by means of a rude text most likely, but he generally doesn't deign to answer when Mycroft calls him back, so it kind of counts anyway.<p>

John is astonished to learn at least ten new things about Mycroft in the space of thirty seconds, which almost exceeds the entirety of everything he'd known about the man several months after meeting him.

"For God's sake, Mycroft! There's no point getting huffy about what I do or do not say to _my_ partner... Fat lot of good it ever did you and your sorry ex... No, you tell me. What does it even mean, 'to love'? It's ambiguous and feeble. I'd rather tell John _precisely_ what I mean... No, really. Oh, very grown up, Mycroft; I'm astounded by the force of your argument. Telling mummy indeed."

He mashes his thumb into the phone to end the call, and looks exasperatedly at John.

They giggle self-indulgently for a bit, and then Sherlock reiterates scornfully, "Telling Mummy!"

John gasps out his reply between fits of laughter: "umm-ahh, eh?"

* * *

><p>"People will talk," grumbles John. "I know, I know; they always do. But, Sherlock, they'll say they <em>knew<em> I always have loved you, and it will be _annoying_."

Suddenly, more seriously, he seeks to clarify: "You did want us to be together, right?"

Sherlock's startles; must have only been keeping a very small fraction of an ear out for John's not-really-discontented mumbling. "What? Oh!" He's all uncharacteristically wide-eyed and straight-backed. "Should I 've asked? Well. Um... are we?"

(John kisses him. He's not going to get sick of this, ever.)

* * *

><p>John dithers and ums and ahs about telling people, but especially Harry. Because, well... Harry. And yet, he has to admit, "Because Mycroft" certainly didn't stop Sherlock. Eventually he shames himself into getting a move on.<p>

Against all expectations, Harry is not as awful as John had feared; he tells her the news, and she comes round to Baker Street with a present. She gives him a fluffy octopus toy like the ones they used to have when they were small enough and chummy enough to squeeze under a bed together to make an octopus's garden. _And_ she doesn't gloat.

He fusses about, making a place on the mantelpiece for his nostalgic octopus (cuddled up to the skull—why not?) and explains for Sherlock's benefit, "When we were little, me and Harry used to have toys just like this—we took them everywhere—we were good friends back then. I don't know what happened to the octopi, but I guess that having been loved so aggressively, they didn't hold together so well..."

"Bit like me and Harry," he's about to say (with no small measure of bitterness) but he doesn't, because instead, he's looked over at Sherlock, and Sherlock looks like someone's shoved a rotten fish under his nose.

"John!"

"John: it's 'Harry and _I_ used to have'."

John sighs with relief. Harry rolls her eyes.

"And octo_puses_. 'Octopus' is _not_ a second declension Latin noun. Octopuses, octopodes, octopods, octopus. All acceptable plurals. But not, and I repeat, not. Octopi. Not."

"Lighten up, Sherlock," says Harry. Flippant is just about her way of life. "Potatus potatum, tomatus t-omatum."

(She grins.)

(Sherlock looks like someone's shoved a rotten fish _and_ a rotten octopus under his nose.)

(John kisses him.)


End file.
